Once Upon a Christmas

by Sarah Morgan

  Surprise flickered in her blue eyes. ‘You’ve only known me for a week.’

  ‘I’ve always been decisive. Now it’s your turn to be honest. Or are you going to tell me that you haven’t felt the chemistry between us?’

  She gave a little gasp and the colour seeped into her cheeks. But she didn’t deny it. In fact, she didn’t speak at all, just turned her head and stared across the valley, leaving him with her profile.

  And that didn’t tell him anything.

  ‘Helen?’ His voice was gentle and he stepped around her so that he could see her face. ‘I’m not intending to jump on you, sweetheart. I just wanted to point out that it’s there.’

  Her eyes locked on his, her expression almost puzzled. ‘Two weeks ago I was marrying David.’

  ‘Three weeks,’ he corrected her firmly. ‘It was three weeks ago, Helen.’

  She shook her head and gave a little shrug. ‘Three weeks. It still doesn’t change the fact that I was marrying another man.’

  ‘But you didn’t love him.’

  She frowned and shook her head. ‘I did. I mean, I do.’ She bit her lip, her expression troubled. ‘I thought I did—now I don’t know any more.’

  ‘All right.’ Oliver put both hands on her shoulders and forced her to look at him. ‘Let’s try something. Tell me what you loved about David.’

  ‘That isn’t exactly a fair question.’

  ‘Why not?’

  She looked at him helplessly. ‘Because right now I’m so angry with him I’m finding it hard to remember.’

  Oliver gave a slow smile. ‘All right, let’s try something different. When did you first realise that you were in love with David?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ She frowned. ‘You make it sound as though it’s a light-bulb moment. One minute you’re not in love and the next minute you are.’

  That’s exactly how it had been for him. A light-bulb moment.

  The moment he’d seen her in the church he’d known.

  Oliver looked at her thoughtfully. ‘And it wasn’t like that for you?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’ve never really thought about it.’ She chewed her lip. ‘I started going out with David when I was nineteen—he was my first proper boyfriend, so I suppose I just grew to love him over time.’

  Oliver’s hands dropped from her shoulders. ‘You’ve been going out with him since you were nineteen?’

  She stared at him. ‘Why is that so shocking?’

  Oliver let out a long breath. ‘Because that means you must have been with him for years.’

  ‘Six years.’ She nodded. ‘What’s wrong with that?’

  ‘So when did you decide to marry him?’

  ‘I don’t know. It just seemed like the logical next step.’

  Oliver looked at her searchingly, wondering if she realised what she was saying.

  There didn’t seem to have been a single grain of romance in her relationship with David.

  ‘What about you?’ She looked at him almost defiantly. ‘You’re not married so you’re obviously not exactly dedicated to commitment.’

  ‘It is precisely my dedication to commitment that has stopped me from marrying the wrong person,’ Oliver said calmly. ‘I’ve been waiting for Miss Right.’

  Helen smiled. ‘But you’ve never found her?’

  ‘I found her a week ago.’

  There was a long silence and a mixture of shock and excitement flickered across her blue eyes. ‘Oliver, you don’t—’

  ‘If you’re about to tell me that I’ve only known you for a week, then I should probably remind you that I’m a very decisive person. Always have been. I know what I want, and once I know what I want I make a point of making sure that I get it.’

  She swallowed hard, her eyes fixed on his. ‘And what do you want, Oliver?’

  ‘You,’ he said softly, lifting a hand and cupping her face as he looked down into her eyes. ‘I want you, Helen. And I’m prepared to wait until you realise that you want me, too.’

  ‘Oliver …’ She tried to pull away but he slid his other hand around her waist and anchored her against him.

  ‘Let’s just try something, shall we?’

  Holding her gently but firmly, he brought his mouth down on hers.

  Her lips were soft and sweet and Oliver gave a groan, waiting for her to pull away or slap his face, but instead she gave a little sigh and her mouth opened under his. His last coherent thought was that kissing Helen was going straight to the top of his list of favourite pastimes and then he sank under the surface of an excitement so intense that it couldn’t be measured.

  His previously clear mind was drugged by sensation and he kissed her fiercely, driven by a ravenous hunger deep inside him.

  He felt her arms slide around his neck and Oliver dragged her closer, frustrated by the thickness of the clothing that separated them, desperate to rip off her layers so that he could feast on her body.

  He felt her quiver against him, felt the intensity of her response as she kissed him back, and knew without doubt that this was the woman he was going to spend the rest of his life with.

  But he had the sense to know that he couldn’t take her there in one enormous leap, and when she suddenly made a little sound and pushed at his chest, he didn’t try and stop her.

  To be honest, he was too shocked to stop her.

  He’d kissed enough women in his life to think that he’d experienced all the different degrees of sexual excitement, but nothing had come close to the way he’d felt kissing Helen. It was as if all the other kisses had been in black and white and this one had been in colour.

  And you didn’t have to be a genius to know that it had been the same for her.

  Her breath was coming in shallow pants and she dropped her eyes, focusing her attention on the middle of his chest. ‘I can’t believe I just did that.’

  ‘You didn’t,’ he said calmly. ‘I did. I was the one who kissed you.’

  ‘But I kissed you back.’

  She sounded so appalled that he smiled.

  ‘Well, just a bit perhaps.’

  ‘Anyone could have seen us.’

  ‘Those sheep over there definitely saw.’

  She didn’t smile and he gave a sigh and stroked the back of his hand down her cheek in a gesture that was supposed to comfort. ‘Is that why you stopped? Because someone might have seen us?’

  ‘Yes. No.’ She was deliciously confused and he felt something shift inside him.

  ‘Helen, stop analysing, sweetheart,’ he advised softly. ‘We kissed and it was—it was …’ What was it? How on earth did you describe a kiss like that? Explosive? Frightening? ‘It was just a kiss.’

  She looked at him. ‘Two weeks ago I was marrying David.’

  ‘Three weeks ago.’ He gritted his teeth. ‘It was three weeks ago.’

  She gave a lopsided smile. ‘You think one more week makes a difference to the fact that I just got carried away with another man?’

  ‘You weren’t carried away, Helen,’ he said easily. ‘You stopped it. If you’d been carried away we’d both now be naked on that rock at severe risk of suffering frostbite.’

  She blushed and looked away. ‘I can’t believe I let you kiss me. That I kissed you back.’ Her expression was troubled. ‘I’ve never—I don’t know what I was thinking of. Why did I let you?’

  ‘Because I’m irresistible,’ he said helpfully, and then sighed when she didn’t laugh.

  ‘Relax, sweetheart. It was only a kiss.’

  Only for him it hadn’t been just a kiss. It had been an affirmation.

  ‘B-but I’m not like that,’ she stammered, pushing a strand of dark hair out of her eyes. ‘I don’t—I mean I’ve never …’

  ‘You don’t go ‘round kissing men you find attractive. Well then perhaps it’s time you started,’ Oliver said, pulling the edges of her jacket together and zipping it up firmly. ‘Come on. Let’s go home.’

  ‘I can’t have an affair with you, Oliver.’
/>   His hands paused on her jacket. ‘Have I asked you to?’

  ‘No. But I’m just making it clear that I can’t.’

  ‘Why can’t you?’

  ‘For a start, I’m seriously on the rebound.’ She gave a wan smile. ‘I’m completely confused. To be perfectly honest, I don’t know how I feel about David anymore but I do know that I’m not a good bet for any man.’

  ‘Then it’s a good job I’ve always been a risk taker,’ Oliver said cheerfully, turning away to stuff the rest of the picnic in the rucksack. ‘Don’t worry about me.’

  ‘I’ll hurt you.’

  ‘In case you haven’t noticed, I’m pretty tough.’ Oliver heaved the rucksack onto his broad shoulders and paced back to her. ‘All right, this is what we’re going to do. Call it your rehabilitation programme. You’re going to carry on working for me, we’re going to carry on living together. You’re going to carry on recovering from David and we’re going to carry on kissing whenever we feel like it and see where it leads us.’

  ‘It won’t lead anywhere. In a few weeks I’ll be going back to London.’

  ‘Right.’ Oliver gave a bland smile and started down the path, wondering what she’d say if she knew that he had no intention of ever letting her return to London again.

  He was going to marry her.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  HELEN’S thoughts were so jumbled up for the rest of the weekend that it was a relief to return to work on Monday.

  She’d spent most of Sunday trying to avoid Oliver, which was virtually impossible in a cottage the size of Bryony’s when the man in question was the size of Oliver.

  Every time she’d turned around he’d seemed to be watching her with that lazy, sexy look that made her insides feel funny.

  And she couldn’t stop thinking about that kiss.

  She tried to think of a time when a kiss from David had left her so churned up, and failed. In fact, she couldn’t even remember what it felt like to kiss David. Maybe it was just because she’d been kissing David since she was nineteen.

  But had his kisses ever felt as though she was on the verge of something deliciously exciting? Had she ever wanted his kisses to carry on and on and never stop?

  Because that’s how she’d felt with Oliver.

  Seriously disturbed, Helen tried to apply some logic to her tumbled feelings.

  She was feeling emotionally bruised and battered and Oliver Hunter had been extraordinarily kind to her. It was only natural that she should feel drawn to him. It was nothing more than that.

  But it felt like a lot more.

  ‘Are you all right, Helen?’ Pam, the receptionist, wandered into her room clutching some notes. ‘You look miles away.’

  ‘Just thinking.’ Helen forced a smile. ‘I’m fine. Are those notes for me?’

  Pam nodded. ‘I know you’ve got a full clinic already, but Howard Marks has asked if you’ll see him.’ She frowned. ‘He saw Dr Hunter last week and after he came out of his appointment he was hovering around Reception for ages as if he was trying to pluck up courage to say something. That’s why I thought you might agree to see him. I’ve just got a feeling …’

  ‘Of course I’ll see him,’ Helen said immediately, taking the set of notes from Pam. ‘Perhaps I’ll just have a quick word with Dr Hunter first before I call him in. Just so that I have some background.’

  ‘Good idea. He’s in between patients at the moment and your next one hasn’t turned up so you’ve been blessed with time to breathe.’

  ‘Thanks, Pam.’

  Wondering how it was that she could feel so at home in a practice after only a week, Helen walked across the corridor to Oliver’s consulting room and tapped on the door.

  She heard his deep voice tell her to enter but her hand paused on the door handle as she braced herself to face him. For the whole weekend all she’d been able to think about had been that kiss.

  What if she’d lost the ability to work with him professionally?

  Just as she was plucking up the courage to open the door, it was tugged open from the inside and Oliver stood there, his blue eyes questioning as they rested on her face.

  ‘Is something wrong?’

  Her eyes dropped to his firm mouth and she forced herself to lift her gaze and look him in the eyes. Something flickered deep in his eyes and then he stood to one side to let her in.

  ‘I wanted to talk about a patient,’ she said quickly, just in case he thought she’d knocked on his door with something more personal in mind. ‘Someone called Howard Marks has asked to see me. Apparently he saw you last week. I just wondered if you could give me a bit of background.’

  Oliver frowned and folded his arms across his chest. ‘Howard has asked to see you? I can’t imagine what for …’ He was silent for a moment and then shook his head. ‘No idea. He’s a very heavy smoker and he suffers from emphysema. He developed a chest infection over Christmas so I gave him antibiotics. I checked his chest last week and it was free of infection. End of story.’

  ‘That’s fine. I just wanted to check that there wasn’t anything I should know before I saw him.’

  Oliver shook his head. ‘Howard is a great guy. He was a friend of my father’s—I’ve known him since I was tiny.’

  ‘Have you?’ Helen tilted her head to one side and looked at him thoughtfully. ‘I wonder whether that’s why he wants to see me.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Nothing.’ She smiled and walked towards the door. ‘Just a thought, and I’m probably wrong anyway so it’s stupid to voice it. I’ll catch you later, Oliver.’

  Suddenly she was breathlessly aware of his broad shoulders and the hard muscle of his thighs outlined by the soft fabric of his trousers. He had a powerful, very masculine physique and without too much effort on her part she could remember just how it had felt to be pressed close to his body.

  And she needed to get herself away from his body as fast as possible so that she could somehow regain control of her mind.

  Not daring to analyse what was happening to her, she hurried back to the sanctuary of her room and closed the door firmly behind her.

  To begin with work had provided a distraction from David. Now it seemed to be providing a distraction from Oliver as well.

  She pressed the buzzer to call her next patient and then smiled as a tall, pale-looking man walked into her room.

  ‘Mr Marks? I’m Helen Forrester. Please, have a seat.’

  He closed the door carefully and sat down opposite her, his fingers playing nervously in his lap.

  ‘What can I do for you, Mr Marks?’

  He shifted awkwardly in his chair and then ran a hand over the back of his neck. ‘I have this thing called emphysema …’

  Helen nodded. ‘Yes. I read your notes. How are you getting on?’

  ‘Well, not great, to be honest.’ He pulled a face. ‘I have to breathe in that blessed oxygen sixteen hours a day and then at Christmas I managed to catch something horrible and I was back in bed, coughing my guts up.’

  ‘But the antibiotics that Dr Hunter gave you cleared that up?’

  ‘Oh, ay.’ He nodded and glanced at her briefly before looking away again. ‘He’s a good doctor is young Oliver.’

  Helen looked at him thoughtfully. ‘And you’ve known him all your life.’

  ‘Knew his father and mother before they were married.’ Howard Marks gave a short laugh. ‘Can’t believe Oliver is grown up, to be honest.’

  ‘It must be a bit difficult, talking to him about some things,’ Helen volunteered, keeping her voice casual, and when he met her eyes she knew that she was right.

  ‘He’s a brilliant doctor,’ the man said quickly, ‘but I remember him as a kid. How can I talk to him about—about—’ He broke off and Helen gave a nod.

  ‘About something really personal,’ she finished gently, and Howard sighed.

  ‘Stupid, isn’t it, really? An old fool like me.’

  ‘If something is worrying you, you sh
ould talk about it. Is that why you asked to see me, Mr Marks? Because I’m a stranger?’

  He gave her a keen look. ‘You’re not stupid, are you?’

  ‘I hope not.’ Helen smiled. ‘And I do understand that it’s easier to talk to a stranger about some things.’

  ‘I thought that. That’s why I asked to see you.’ He broke off and gave a long sigh. ‘And now I’m here I don’t know how to say it. You’ll think I’m completely ridiculous.’

  Helen shook her head. ‘I won’t think that. If the problem is serious enough to bring you here then it’s serious enough for me to take it seriously.’

  He glanced towards the door as if he was contemplating running through it. ‘Your next patient is probably waiting.’

  ‘Then they can wait a bit longer,’ Helen said calmly. ‘Please, trust me, Mr Marks. Tell me what’s worrying you and we’ll try and find a solution together.’

  ‘I’m sixty-six,’ he wheezed. ‘Been married for forty-two years and we’ve always had a good—well, we’ve always enjoyed—’

  ‘Sex?’ Helen’s voice was calm. ‘Has it become a problem, Mr Marks?’

  He slumped in his chair and ran a hand over his face. ‘I can’t believe I’m discussing it with you. You’re younger than my daughter.’

  ‘But I’m also a professional who cares about your health,’ Helen reminded him, ‘and sexuality is part of health. If it’s any consolation, plenty of patients have discussed exactly the same issue with me. It’s very common, particularly in patients who are suffering from respiratory conditions like you.’

  He looked at her. ‘You’ve talked to other patients about this?’

  ‘Absolutely. In London there are specialist nurses who deal with this area.’

  He gave an embarrassed smile. ‘When you get to my age you assume that people think you don’t have sex any more.’

  ‘Sex is an important part of a relationship,’ Helen said quietly. ‘Do you want to tell me exactly what the problem is?’

  He rubbed a hand over his face. ‘Well, I just run out of energy. And I suppose I’m frightened because I get breathless.’